844 days, 20,256 hours, 1,215,360 minutes, or 72,921,600 seconds. That is the approximate duration of my world tour. I never wanted it to end and now, in a manner of speaking, I suppose it never has to. If you wish to go by country do so by clicking on one above. They are numbered in the order I visited them, more or less. If you enjoy reading about it even a tenth as much as I enjoyed living it then you will not have wasted your time. Grab a refreshing beverage, settle in a comfortable chair, and make a journey across the world, experiencing it as I did. Then get off your ass and check it out for yourself. You're not getting any younger.

Mystery Volcano Eruption Solves Global Cooling Puzzle (NatGeo)

A newly detected 19th-century volcanic eruption may solve the mystery of a strangely cool decade in the early 1800s, researchers say—but the location of the volcano itself remains a puzzle.

Scientists have long blamed the 1815 eruption of an Indonesian volcano, Tambora, for a worldwide cold snap the following year—the so-called year without a summer.

But the entire decade from 1810 to 1819 was about 0.9 degree Fahrenheit (0.5 degree Celsius) cooler than normal—making the dip in temperatures prior to Tambora a mystery.

Now the case appears to be closed: A recent analysis of ice cores from Greenland and Antarctica reveal that in 1809, a volcano somewhere in the tropics erupted, a new study says.

Geologic evidence for an eruption has yet to be found, and scientists don't even know where the earlier eruption occurred, said study leader Jihong Cole-Dai, an environmental chemist at the South Dakota State University in Brookings.

But they do know it happened somewhere in the tropics, Cole-Dai added.

That's because only the tropics' particular wind patterns are able to carry volcanic material so thoroughly around the world.

Coldest Decade

In ice cores dating to 1809 and 1810, scientists found high concentrations of sulfuric acid, which forms when eruptions spew sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere.

When in the air, the expelled bits of sulfuric acid scatter and reflect sunlight, Cole-Dai said.

"That reduces the amount of energy that actually comes into the Earth's and that helps to cool the planet," Cole-Dai said.

The amount of sulfuric acid found in ice cores from Earth's poles suggests the eruption was about half the size of Tambora's, which spewed about a hundred megatons of sulfur dioxide into the lower atmosphere.

"Even half of that, 50 megatons, would still be very large," Cole-Dai said.

The newfound eruption ushered in the coldest decade in the past 500 years, he added.

"The sulfur you put in there will come down as sulfuric acid, and that's generating acid rain."

Findings reported October 25 in Geophysical Research Letters.

The 1815 eruption of the Tambora volcano (pictured on June 3, 2009) in Indonesia did not cause global cooling in the early 1800s. Instead a newly detected 19th-century volcanic eruption—whose location is still a mystery—was the culprit, scientists said in December 2009.

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'Now as I look around, it's mighty plain to see, this world is such a great and a funny place to be....' No job. No house. No car. No clue. Me in a nutshell. Might as well hit the road, right? So far: Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Nepal, Bangladesh, United Arab Emirates, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Abkhazia, Denmark, Germany, Czech Republic, Tunisia, Morocco, Western Sahara. Mauritania, Mali, South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Turkey. USA. Next: ???

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I wander this world in search of that which I will never find. It is the journey that matters, not the destination. Along the road to oblivion I may, one day, be able to ask the most interesting question. Is the answer relevant? Or more importantly, would I really want to know after all?